Do you despise groupthink?

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I know that one of our key traits as aspies is the propensity to see things more objectively, without a social context / filter, and express the same...which can get us in trouble. But I've always had a theory, that this is not due to just ignorance alone, but rather it's mostly motivated by how repugnant we find groupthink norms, how we've been disproportionately wronged by them in the past, and it's kind of our way of "lashing out" when we find ourselves faced with one of those unspoken groupthink-inducing scenarios where it triggers an internal monologue like "ummm... now I *know* _something_ is expected of me here, but I'm not quite sure how to define it, and it doesn't totally make sense...ahh just f*** it, I'll do what *I* believe is right".

You know, this is one of the reasons I love that cult classic from the 1970s, "Logan's Run". I've watched it a few times, both pre- and post-diagnosis, and I admired Logan for not being a groupthinker, for seeking out evidence that Carousel and Lastday were shams, just elaborate groupthink mind-control mechanisms to sustain the "utopia". Not that Logan was an aspie but rather that he saw past the irrationality of groupthink, at risk to himself of being ostracized. I find that most NTs put more emphasis on that middle / third tier of Maslow's pyramid than we do, because they also realize it sustains the two lower levels (basic needs and security) whereas we tend to be more principle-based and see it upwards the proper way it was meant to be. Tribal psychology that hasn't vanished, you might say (where the NT majority is concerned).

However, I try to remain optimistic that the majority has taken more cues from the dark side of history, that groupthink is not really what it's cracked up to me. I mean heck, when you had millions of people inspired by Mein Kampf, and that time 40 years ago when about 1000 followers of the Rev. Jim Jones moved to Guyana and drank the Kool-aid...well gee goshdarnit, on any level, groupthink can be a horrible and pernicious thing
Think for yourself, people of all neurologies and backgrounds!!

I also hate groupthink. I think that individuals should be allowed their own opinions and ways of life. I've noticed that the children's tv show, Barney uses a lot of groupthink.

But wait, if a majority of us agree that we don't like groupthink, are we not also engaging in groupthink? I'm confused now. Can't go along with any group, so I have to make up some random position non aligned with anyone? Or am I just trying to be a pain in the a?

I just automatically go away from groups, I don't trust them. I have never been able to operate on that level, I just can not sync with a group, any group. And crowds freak me out, I stay well away from crowds. I almost got sucked under and trampled at a U2 concert when I was 18.(something I just now recalled 30 years later, wow, that was scary....) No crowds,thank you.

Hehe, well yeah, that's the paradox, isn't it? Just like an anonymous wise man once said, "People have one thing in common - they are all different."

Absolutely

The «group-think» that bothers me the most is statism (unquestioning belief in de facto propaganda).

Thanks for posting that link. After watching it, how anyone could think what's talking about in the video is "conspiracy" rather than obvious fact is beyond me. It also explains why I can't stand the evening "talk shows" in present day. Shape their overly malleable (mushy) minds at night while the daytime "news" talk shows do that same exact thing during the day.

My opposition to "Groupthink" since my teen years through the present is so negative it's visceral. I get a sick feeling of disgust. I've always had an aversion to anyone telling me what to think.

When a group marches lockstep in a unified direction about something after they've been whipped up by manipulators....I'll take my chances on my own.

I also don't agree with the argument that a non-conformist shares the same views with other non-conformists so therefore a non-conformist is a conformist no different than the conformists the non-conformist is opposed to.

The most insidious version of groupthink is the "Delphi method" <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delphi_method> developed by Project RAND or the RAND Corporation used by governments. In other words, it is hardly free thinking.

yeah, RAND.... why don't people do something about those clowns? They have been doing slimy stuff behind the scenes for decades.

Daniel Ellsberg hurt them badly.

Aspies often have the capacity to think in new ways, which is inimical to group-think. Very few NT's can do that. This means that we have opinions which can be original ones. We are naturally questioning and cynical. I don't believe anything very much, unless it can be supported with objective fact and evidence. A lot of people will meekly accept what they're told, which I have never understood. For me, I find left-wing Group-think particularly annoying, as it always devolves into the State telling people how to live their lives.

Hehe, yep, the man's still alive at 87!! Going way back to the Nixon years, before I was born...but I heard of him

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Ellsberg

"If everyone is thinking alike, then somebody isn't thinking." -- George S. Patton

He may as well have been describing Hollywood, with all of its reboots, remakes, and sequels.

Not at all. If a majority of people individually reach a position or decision through careful, rational consideration (the democratic ideal) then that's hardly groupthink. What repels and baffles me--especially in politics--is when people side with a group on purely emotional grounds, with no rational consideration, then blindly stick to it regardless of arguments or evidence.

" 'They remind me of the fireflies on Mercator. You remember how the millions of those pseudoinsects would cluster on hillocks and trees and all pulsate with their light together? Those on one hill would answer the beacon flashes of those on another hill, and yet they were creatures so small that fifty of them could be heaped on the end of your finger--and blind. Ah, they spelled out derisive words with their pulsing light on the hillsides, but the individuals of them were ignorant of words and of concepts and of all else.
"The people of Earth are like that, which is why it is called the Haunted Planet. The Hive Ghost hovers over them invisible, and they feel it from one end of their communities to the other. We can handle Earth individuals s though they were furniture or stones, but we cannot handle the Hive Ghost that hangs over them...' "
--R A Lafferty, The Reefs of Earth (1968; 2017)